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Monday, November 30, 2009

Late Princess Ferial had lots of photos in public and also in private during the royal years more than any of her siblings , here are part of them

The late Princess captured the hearts and minds of people around the world when she spoke for the first on Arabic Channel MBC about herself then her brother then about her father in exile with Ricardo Karm. Karm for sure owed for the Egyptian royal the big return on TV, not so many are interested in watching Farah Diva but many were interested to watch and hear the princess of Egypt for the first time.
Of course the more focused interview with the late Princess was with Amr Adib ; I believe that interview was one of the most important interview Adib has done during his career regardless of what I think about him. “Here is what I thought about it”

Her last televised interview with Maslmany on Dream TV 2 and up till this moment I have been searching for it online, already it caused controversy in Egypt.
By the way the Royalists in the facebook have opened a virtual condolence book for the princess and I hope from the Nasserites and nationalists to respect the royalists and leave them alone. This is not an opportunity to express political points of views ; it is an opportunity to show some civilized attitude.
Tomorrow the funeral is expected to held after Al-Asr prayer at the Rafai Mosque , also the memorial service will be held there. Suzanne Mubarak has called both Yasmine Sharawy and former King Ahmed Fouad yesterday to share the first family condolences . King Ahmed Fouad will arrive with the body of his sister tomorrow.

Update:

The former royal family and the coffin of the late princess will arrive Cairo airport at 7.05 PM Cairo local time on the board of Egypt

There are speculations that Egypt and Abu Dhabi will attract the foreign investments in the region after the current fall of Dubai; well it is falling now and is falling ugly with no doubt. I do not know on what basis these speculations were based upon ; Egypt is no Abu Dhabi for sure , second for God sake our stock market is feeling the woes of Dubai as soon as the market is back in business after the Eid !! “ I think they should close it again till things become stable again”

The blow to Dubai will affect the Dubai Emirati investments in Egypt negatively and the size of these investments is not small not to mention our economy will be affected in a way or another , you got Emaar in the market, you got both Al-Futtiam cousins in construction and retail too and you got Dubai Ports world too if you have forgotten !! I do not have doubt that EFG-Hermes and Pioneers too will join the club not to mention the huge Citadel Capital which has investments there. I think Dubai Capital and Dubai holding have shares in different Citadel Capital subsidiaries like ASEC and Glassworx if I am not mistaken. “Perfect time to enlist your shares isn't he market , is not it !!??”

Even if we attract foreign investments from Dubai to Egypt ; what good will return on the Egyptian people if only a very small percentage of the society enjoys the real fruits of these pseudo economic reforms !!?? Already we are not that foreign investments attraction heaven thanks to corruption, bureaucracy and the fear of future political instability following Mubarak’s death.

We do can attract foreign investments from Dubai and from all over the world not to mention we can become a real Jaguar on the Nile ‘as the Ganzoury’s cabinet used to name Egypt’ if we become a real democracy with a real transparent political system. We can become more powerful than Dubai because in the end Dubai is just a city not a whole great country with lots and lots of unused resources and potentials above them : The human resource.

I believe Dubai can create cash in a fast way if Sheikh Mo sells his horses , if all those construction companies stop building these useless big buildings ; what use of having the biggest and longest buildings in the world with a broken economy for God sake !!???

The problem of Dubai is that it has faced a huge problem during the financial crisis and Sheikh Mo did not want his citizens nor the world to know the ugly truth and thus he kept it under his carpet till the time he could not hide anything !! Just a typical dictatorial Arabic way of thinking !!??

Princess Ferial Farouk has passed away today at 7 AM in Switzerland. She was 71 years old ; she had just celebrated her 71st birthday from couple of weeks ago , her birthday was a real big event in Egypt ; the eldest daughter of the beloved royal couple. Up till now that event is remembered historically by those who saw the big celebrations of the little princess ; despite the fact she was not a baby boy but the celebrations accompanied her birthday were so great that the foreign press spoke about it

Princess Ferial lived a long tough life , I know some of you will be amazed at the choice of the word “tough” well with my all respect unlike the rest of her sisters and her brother she had seen it all. She saw the peak of her father rule and his awful fall along with the end of her family rule to Egypt. She was the baby girl her mother and father adored and loved. She was the little princess whom the Egyptian people watched growing on the magazine covers along her sisters. She was the little girl who woke up one day to find out that life inside the Royal palaces was not truly a bless and her parents could not live any longer with each other after a lovely young love. She was the eldest daughter who saw her father wedded to a young bride older than her by few years. She was the eldest daughter who chose to go with her father to exile despite she may not understood what it really meant on that day in hot July.She was that teenage girl that for the first time in her life walked in a real street and bought an ice-cream from a real ice-cream parlor just like commoners only in exile ; she was that teenage girl that felt happy that she escaped the big Royal prison to freedom with no real understanding for the price she and her family had forced to pay to become commoners. She was that young lady who found herself responsible of her brother ; the young king of Egypt and younger sister after the sudden enigmatic death of her father. She was the woman who took after her younger sister till her death than after few years she lost her other sister suddenly with no warning or any other thing. She was the woman who saved her young brother ; whom she used to hold him in her hands when he was a baby .

Citizen Ferial Farouk suffered a lot , she was not that princess from fairy tales; in fact in her interviews she seemed to dislike the life behind the royal palaces.

Princess Ferial was among the people that I wished to meet and interview and honestly I tried to reach to her through my connections ; I wanted to meet her next time she would visit Egypt but God had better plans for her. I am so happy that some of her last visit to Egypt’s photos were provided to me to publish for the first time in the Egyptian blogsphere “Thank you so much dear Omar and I will never forget this”

I think God gave her the opportunity to see again the memory of her family revived in Egypt ; monarchy is not coming back but gratitude and respect are coming back. The last time she came her , she was received in a very welcoming warm way.

Princess Ferial Farouk had one daughter Yasmine from her marriage ; Yasmine is half Egyptian-half Swiss and is currently married and living in Egypt. Her husband is the grandson of famous Egyptian feminist Huda Sharawy. Yasmine is from the active members in the society in keeping up the Mohamed Ali Royal heritage live and preserved a long time of neglect

I am not her remembering as a princess of a royal family but also a strong woman who managed to stand out against all those hardships.

May Allah bless her soul , please remember her in your prayers regardless of your faith.

Saturday, November 28, 2009

There were news from couple of days ago that Zine El Aibdine Ben Ali of Tunisia was infected by swine flu and this is why he had cancelled his meetings and public appearance this week.

We took the matter as a joke in Egypt but it seems in Tunisia it is a joke because there is a rumor that reached to internet saying that the old dictator with no vice president has travelled abroad to receive treatment !!??

Is it something more serious than swine flu ??? Officially there is no vice president for Ben Ali , it is not only Egypt that is ruled by an old man with no vice president.

Unofficially there is the rumored candidate ; his son in law media mogul Sakher al-Materi as his son Mohamed is still too young to rule a whole country like his daddy " he was born in 2004" Lately I stumbled in the facebook with a group calling his wife shopaholic Laila to run for the office !!

Well it is important to keep it in the family whether the father or the son or the son in law !!

Here is the full the documentary produced by Arabia Cinema production company which I hinted to before. The documentary chronicles the Algerian attacks before and after the two match from an Egyptian view with English subtitles. By the way this documentary is from a very radical biased Egyptian view and I am not ashamed to say it because it is natural thing ; all what we see from Algeria is radical biased view to what happened in those two weeks. Honesty makes me say that there is a scene which is from a clip unrelated to the sorrowful events that followed the match in Khartoum , which is the scene of those young men beating another young man.

Egyptian actress and writer Isaad Yunis ; the CEO of the Arabia Cinema production company has been very vocal against Algeria after the attacks of Khartoum to the level that her company has boycotted the Algerian film festivals and cinemas not to mentions directors and actors too till we receive an official proper apology for what had happened. Isaad Yunis is currently being criticized for her statement that she was a proud of her pharaonic ancestry.
Back to the documentary , well I believe it is a nice attempt despite being biased ; one of the problems that has weakened our position is that we did not document our version of the story like the Algerian football team and hooligans.

Friday, November 27, 2009

First of all there is a good news : Mona is still in Dream , at least this is what I get from the repeated promo in the channels. Second of all there is a part from Mona’s firing intro last Wednesday that reached to the internet at last , you can’t imagine how I searched for it “Thanks Hanady :D”

Up till now there is apparent reason why Mona went ballistic like that ; there are three theories :

1) She showed how the Israeli press covered the whole crisis.

2) Earlier this day there was a firing meeting between the heads of the private channels to discuss the coverage of the game with lots of criticism to TV shows “Strangely her TV show was less vocal unlike other TV shows”

3) As concerned citizen she is fed up with the government.

You must know that the Egyptian Ambassador in Sudan spoke last night on TV angrily. I also noticed that press ignored her too and I do not know why ; she did not speak more than we are saying.

I want to say something , I read some stupid comments from Algeria attacking Mona , with my all respect you do not know Mona or what kind of program she presents and I doubt that you have a program like hers or a TV personality her in your media !! Also please think outside the box of football federations and associations , it is not about defeat ; it is about a whole system failure. Please think about that when something bad happens in your country and you can’t express on TV.

I am amazed at the official statements and leaks which state that the Egyptian regime knew about the bad attentions of the Algerian regime and their support for the Algerian hooligans for at least 2 days prior to the match; in other words the Egyptian regime knew what was going to happen and it let it happen to its citizens in Khartoum !!!??

I am not speaking about Algeria this time, I am speaking about a system failure. It is not the first time we know that our regime is a reactive , in fact this time it is worse ; it is not even reactive nor anything , it has been standing still since last week leaving us to explode from anger.

Officially we did not do anything except vague statements regarding the attacks on our citizens in Khartoum including the statement of the President himself, we did not do anything officially for real to stop these lies against Egypt in the world because of this damned match. Alaa Mubarak’s phone calls are not enough to make people forget that night.

Up till now we have been humiliated on a daily basis whether in online or in press or on TV and our regime is watching, with my all respect we are not waiting for couple of live TV shows to attack Algeria ; we want a real official action to restore back the rights of our citizens who were attacked in Khartoum and our businesses that were damaged in Algeria.

I respect Algeria though and its people still as an Egyptian citizen I want my government to do something officially to make me feel I can raise my head high again at least temporarily . If the insult comes from an enemy is a natural thing but when it comes from someone I consider a friend and an ally ; it is another thing. The insult did not come from Algeria only this time but it came from Sudan. Our strategic ally has abandoned us despite what Mubarak had done unfortunately for Bashir and the ICC tribunal ; of course this is the natural result when you depend on someone like Bashir and his regime. Yes Omar Soliman went there accompanied with Abu El-Gait for protocol uses only to thank Al-Bashir and remind him of what he and Mubarak had done for him to escape the ICC but then what !!!?? His personal envoy goes to Algeria and claims that they had fed up with us !!??

Could this happen in time of President Nasser or President Sadat ?? I do not think so.

Mubarak had the opportunity to gain lots of points but he wasted as usually along with his son Gamal ; they do not deserve these points unlike Alaa Mubarak whom suddenly became the voice of the average Mohamed in Egypt.

I do not know what kind of regime is in Algeria but surely it won a lot of undeserved points because of this game which has entered our political history before our sports history.

Of course we think about it , I could not expect our regime to attack in different way than the way it is doing ; this is a regime that loves failures ; addicted to failures to be accurate. It is a natural thing to reach to this result.

Hopefully we learn from mistakes ; not repeating them at least as citizens !!

You know most people thank God that we did not win as our fans could have been slaughtered in Khartoum , well I thank God now that our regime did not act as it should because then Gamal Mubarak could have won undeserved popularity ; let him lose more and more as we do not forget easily

Thank God again that Tareq Salahi is not that proud of his Arabic roots just like ; it is a relief. Yes Salahi is a member at the American task force on Palestine which organizes Polo matches for the cause but I can’t consider a real American Arab !! I bet he joined this organization only to organize this Polo matches.

For crashing on a State dinner in the White house like that is alarming ; attending the White house dinner without an official invitation and going there like this require a lot of nerve !!?? From a security point of view I know some people are going to lose their jobs !! Man I can’t imagine something like that to happen in Egypt with all the security frenzy to protect Mubarak so you can imagine to find out that it happened in the White house ; in a dinner attend by Barack Obama with all the threats surrounding him !!

Still I love the fact that Joe Biden was smiling like an idiot between the Salahis

Did Salahi speak with Emmanuel about the Peace process in the Mideast !!??

P.S despite my anger and disgust from the Algerian regime and media , I send my greetings to Algerian people and tell them Happy Eid and hopefully next year insh Allah our relations will return even stronger than before. This crisis showed how both of us were alienated from each other thanks to politics.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Ahmed Mekky has released a new Rap song but this time he is singing for Egypt. Egyptian-Algerian Mekky demands an official apology from Algeria for what happened. It is the best among all these songs released lately may be because it is more honest and it is not about the crisis rather about Egypt itself.

Today I felt so angry and violated , I was frustrated that our regime did what it is best at and made us lose our rights after all these Algerian attacks whether in the media or in Khartoum or the Egyptian interests in Algeria itself. I feel so tired as if I am speaking in a lonely valley and suddenly Mona came to express this anger in a very moderate way comparing to my anger.

Of course for Mona ,it was not moderate. Mona was tough in her attack more than usual; yes other TV hosts use to attack the regime more like the daily attack of Muslamany but this was something new for Mona.

Now there are speculations that this could be her last episode from her popular show and I wish this will be untrue because she is the most valuable asset in Dream TV ; Dream TV will suffer a lot without her and Ahmed Bahgat knows this very well.

Again Hats off to El-Shazely , she was my voice to the world on air ; in fact she was not my voice only but the voice of 80 million Egyptians who got sick of this humiliation and inconsideration from the regime’s part.

I was wondering why Saudi Arabia was away from this Egyptian-Algerian crisis and of course I forgot the Saudis are busy with the front they opened with the Houthis in Yemen.

Up till now the Saudis did not achieve any kind of victory over the Houthis ,on the contrary the Houthis up till now have the upper hand. The Houthis are continuing to release videos online showing allegedly Saudi POWs from the Saudi navy.

It seems that Saudi Arabia has requested a Jordanian military aid , the Hashemite kingdom has reportedly sent a commando squad to fight the Houthis !! We are speaking about 2,000 Jordanian commandoes here.

I hope Egypt stays away from this , we had a very bad experience in Yemen ; terrible bad experience hopefully the Saudis and Jordanians would learn from it “ it does not seem so”

Here the media plays an important role ; the truth is lost between the Houthis and the Saudis for real. Of course the fact that almost if not all the Shiites in the world are supporting the Houthis makes this on going war seems to be a war between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Again hopefully Egypt will not be dragged to Yemen and the Jordanians will get away from it as fast as they

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Algerian Al Chorouk is not only specialized in creating diplomatic regional crises but it is also specialized in theft. Algerian Al Chorouk has stolen an Op-ed by Al Jazeera TV host Ahmed Mansour which was published in Al Dostor last Wednesday the 18th in Cairo and published it in their tabloid paper. Mansour who did not watch the matches was criticizing the buzz around the game in Egypt. What he had said was acceptable and logic ; there was nothing new about it because it was said by other writers too. Now Algerian Al Chorouk published with no permission from Mansour nor Al Dostor and it did edit it too. The Algerian tabloid has created a crisis to Mansour himself who was regarded in the past 48 hours as traitor bastard working for Al Jazeera and writes in Algeria's most hated and disgusting newspaper against his own country and people.Of course Mansour is a regular target for the official media to be attacked and so what the Algerian paper was like an open invitation to be attacked in Egypt ; in fact to put his life and the life of his family in danger. Now a question to the Algerians : Why do you trust this tabloid if it steals other people's work without their permission ?? !!??

What makes me angry the fact that we are being accused in front of the whole the world of lying. Please watch this segment from Cairo Today show as there is a part of a documentary that chronicles the events of before and after the two matches from Egyptian point of view with English translation.

The story itself in summary without any details , without any character background is a a tragedy and when you go deeper and deeper in it you will find yourself in front of an original classic Greek Tragedy ; A Middle Eastern Greek tragedy or even better an Egyptian Greek tragedy. I admit that I thought twice in publishing it , in fact this is the reason why I am late in publishing this tragedy of course besides the Egyptian-Algerian current crisis.
You may know that there is a huge debate in Egypt regarding the Egyptians currently working and living in Israel especially those who married Israeli women and have children who bear the opposite citizenship of Egypt and Israel.
It is a huge debate with lots of unanswered questions regarding the loyalty of those men and their families , the fate of those children and how the Egyptian law would deal with them not to mention how the society can treat them. It is a dilemma especially that the number of Egyptians in Israel is increasing not decreasing thanks to the economic conditions. It is not about Judaism , Muslim man can marry a Jewish woman but it is about the Israeli passport , the same tragedy Egyptian men face when they marry women from Arab 48 community.
Earlier this month Al Masry Al Youm shocked the whole Arab nation not only Egypt when it reported that there was a Bat Mitzvah of an Israeli Egyptian girl in Sinai attended by her Muslim Egyptian father and his family in his resort near Taba. When I said that it shocked the whole Arab nation I meant really these words because as soon as it hit the internet most Arab news websites copied the news and started to comment on it. The report was taken from a Haartez’s report about 12 years old Yasmin ; the half Egyptian Muslim-half Israeli Jewish girl who speaks Arabic with her dad and Hebrew with her mother ; lives in Ramat HaSharon in Israel and spends the summer vacation in her dad’s resort in Taba and her granddad’s farm in Cairo. Without going in to details and knowing the name of that Muslim father who celebrated his daughter Bat Mitzvah , the news was very provoking in the first place but when you know that Yasmin’s complete name is Yasmin Hisham Mohamed Nassim ; it will turn in to a Greek tragedy.
Hisham Nassim , the father is known to be an adventurer businessman who owns two resorts in Sinai and in Western desert. Egyptians only knew about him when he suddenly crossed the great sand sea and we got a new hero in the Guinness Book of records ; of course the Egyptian media cheered especially when they realized that he is the son of Mohamed Nassim ; it was enough for the journalists to stop at this and not to dig more to find a big skeleton in his closet. Being the son of Mohamed Nassim was enough I think and honestly I can’t deny that I was not happy when I read the news and I even thought of writing a post about him in order to speak about his dad but what you know !!

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

The offline and online press are so so surprised and shocked to know that Israel holds talks with Oman . It is well known that both countries had had relations since 1996 officially ; mostly economic relations that were cut during the second intifida due to the public and regional pressure on Oman then.

I believe the relations Israeli-Omani unofficial relations go back little bit longer just like Morocco.

This time he slammed Al Jazeera Channel along with the Algerian Ambassador in Cairo.

He said that the Algerian press criticized his way of talking and that it is not how the Presidents’ offspring should speak ; well then the Algerian press should not count him as a first son but rather a regular citizen especially that they would not understand the President’s offspring language there !!

He is speaking in this way to express all those on the cafes and drivers “ The man of the working class.”

He did not say that the Algerians were Jews , he respects Algeria as a country.

He is a Muslim man who fears God and as a Muslim he respects all religions.

He does not want Ambassador Al-Hagar in Egypt “The later refused to apologize”

He does not have any political ambition what so ever. “We know that , it is his brother”

I do not know why Alaa Mubarak is speaking to the media suddenly all that time , it is not an attempt to help his brother in his plans because he simply overshadows him.

Is this an attempt to absorb the public anger ? The President’s son is angry and he is speaking the language of people but it is too late to make anything on the official level so Alaa would go on the air and say that he can’t take it anymore and enough is enough ??

Is this a political game ?? Well he said that he is not a member in the party “really !!??” and he does not have any political ambition what so ever plus it is his brother who should beware from his growing popularity ; I will say it again this man managed to created a popularity in the Egyptian street since last Friday his brother failed to create for 10 years now.

Is this a real sincere talk from the heart ?? I know you will think that I am kidding but think in this ; Alaa earlier this year has lost his eldest son and as a person he has not been exposed to such violent experience , he could be moved from inside. Alaa in two calls mentioned how the Egyptian Children who accompanied their families were in danger “he mentioned the story of his friend who was attacked by Algerian hooligans before the match in front of his 6 years old girl and in that call above he mentioned his friend’s son who was there and up till now is suffering from nightmares” .

Also as the son of President Mubarak and despite being the modest down to earth son compared to his brother Gamal Alaa has never been put in such situation. Alaa mentioned that he found the Algerian hooligans in the stadium doing these signs to him and his brother that they would be killed when they were sitting in the VIP box ; the VIP box in Egypt is a real box with protecting glass with fans who come to cheer for football not to threat anyone by anything. On the way to the hotel his convoy passed by those Algerian hooligans then in the hotel till their departure with the national team he began to witness what panic was from the crisis in front of him. I know I sound strange here but I do not think all the time in political conspiracy theories nor I am biased because he is supporting our calls for our dignity ; the dignity which his father did a wonderful job in wasting it for 28 years but I am speaking a person who did not suffer all in his life and suddenly in one year he faces two shocks ; may be the second is nothing compared to the first but the first made him vulnerable at least psychologically to watch for what he is saying. But if he was shaken psychologically , could not they stop him in presidency ; the man actually is creating diplomatic crisis !!?? It has never happened in any country that a first son comes on the air and attacks another country and its ambassador in this way.

I do not get it , I am trying to figure out what behind this openness on the media.

He said that he will speak again and again till something is really done ; I think this means we will hear from him and may be see on TV soon !!

Do you know who Israel will send to Egypt as its coming Ambassador ?? Yitzhak Levanon and do you know who is his mother ??

His mother is Israel’s first madam Shula Cohen ; the infamous Israeli spy caught in Lebanon in 1960s. Shula was the queen of prostitution in Lebanon since the 1940s and she was arrested in 1960s with a big scandal. She was extradited in 1967 for Syrian POWs. She had been a professional prostitute turned in to a madam with several brothels in Beirut , her clients and acquaintances including real VIPs from presidents to ministers to army generals in Lebanon . Here case indeed was very interesting because what made her exposed was an economic plot made by Israel to destroy the Lebanese Economy. The Lebanese economy in 1960s was booming and I am sorry if I say that it was booming thanks to the money Nasser spent there.

You can watch Zaven’s episode about the Lebanese intelligence history to know about the arrest of Shula. Prime minister Rashid Karami was the first man to lead the Lebanese security to Shula’s Lebanese accomplice who led them to her ; Karami was among our allies in Lebanon , very close allies by the way.

Being the son of a professional prostitute is not included in your resume especially when you are one hell of diplomat with experience in the Arab and this is why the AFP report about him doesn’t include this juicy info. Already I know it will only take 48 hours or even less when our press realizes who Shula Cohen was.

Of course I do not have to imagine the new title the national press will call on Levanon ; for sure it will be the son of bitch and technically it is true he is a son of a bitch.

The Algerian-Egyptian media war which reached to a diplomatic crisis for sure has political reasons in the beginning and in the end , it is only using football and the long rivalry between the Algerian and the Egyptians not to mention the suppression both people live in.

I will speak about the Algerian media escalation which I do not fully understand and I am not alone ; many people like me wonder what is going in Algeria. We can understand what is going in Egypt very well our regime found a golden opportunity thanks to the Algerian media. We know very well our regime and its nasty tricks.

I know very well Press in most republic countries in the Arab world except Lebanon is controlled by the regime even those publications owned by the private sector and I know in a country like Algeria where the army controls everything no single article could be published without the approval of the regime especially when it tackles other country and so this campaign against us with all these fabrications were approved by the Algerian regime …why ?? From the 16th to the 18th the Algerian media went mad turning us to some kind of monsters to the Algerian public and of course we are people of high ego and self esteem then we got the war in Khartoum.

The point of no return I believe was when the Algerian press decided to go on with its lies that more 10 Algerian fans have been killed in Cairo despite the official denials of the Algerian Ambassador. It is not about the bus , for God sake there was not a single bus any Egyptian team took in Algeria that was not attacked but we have never spoken about it thanks to higher orders to preserve our relations with sister Algeria and guess what the Algerian media used to deny that there had been attacks there against our players too. Back to our issue there was kind of official approval in Algiers for this nasty lies as the ministers who came to Cairo had returned pretending that they were in hell. It is normal that the Algerian people go mad and angry to the level that our Egyptian businesses and interests in Algeria attacked along with our community is trying to leave the country as fast as they could.

Honestly starting from the attack on our businesses and interests I began to suspect that there is something more than sports rivalry and football fanaticism. When I began to read in Algerian Chorouk direct calls for the Algerians to leave Djeezy I knew that someone does not want Egyptian investments in Algeria and every economic decision has a Political decision behind it not a sports decision I am afraid.

This suspicion has grown more and more when I found out that suddenly Naguib Sawiris has to pay 100 of millions of dollars as taxes in Algeria right after the attack on his factory and his companies not to mention the theft of mobile handsets worth millions of dollars from his Ring Stores in Algeria which were smashed too “You can find the videos of its destruction all over the Youtube”. Naguib Sawiris is the first Egyptian businessman to hurt from the football curse as it seems but there are other businesses that suffered like Arab contractors which decided to freeze its project there. Up till now Citadel Capital does not suffer from the other woes of Egyptian companies there but may be because Citadel Capital originally is made of Gulf capital money.

From the 16th to the 18th of November things in Algeria were not like in Egypt , things were normal in Cairo compared to the battle prepared in Algiers by the State with false reports from Cairo and from false statements from ministers. In Algeria there was kind of public mobilization. Starting from the 16th of November the Algerians began to pack their things and head to Sudan. President Bouteflika and the army decided to transport thousands of Algerian football fans on their expenses , sorry not only on their expenses but on the air jets of the army itself. Thousands of Algerian football fans did not come on the board of Air Algerie but rather on the board of Algerian air forces C-130.

Algerians football fans or rather hooligans did not waste any time from buying or rather emptying the markets of Khartoum from weapons like knives and swords..etc. There were warning from a possible attack especially we had hopes that we would win and in that case those armed hooligans could kill our fans and our national teams in Khartoum. Our regime made us believe that everything was fine and that they would send special force 777 to protect our team plus Sudan had taken its precautions.. of course in real world we did not find 777 nor Sudan had imagined it would face something like that in that long night in Khartoum.I will not comment or speak about who were exactly the Algerian hooligans that night in the Stadium or in the street , especially in the street who chased our fans. There are lots of theories , some said that they were army soldiers ,some said they were ex-convicts pardoned by Bouteflika and some said that they were from the infamous “Haitysat” who are actually the thugs employed in elections

Here I am trying to find a real reason for the official Algerian escalation again this is not a free country with a free press ,it is as corrupted as us. As far as I could know till the first match the Algerian regime has been friendly to our regime , it is was not considered from the new axis of “Iran,Syria and Qatar” in the region. Our relations were perfect and it is enough to know Egypt was no.1 Arab investor in Algeria with billions of dollars invested there for giants like Orascom telecom and Citadel Capital.

There are couple of theories on why suddenly the Algerian state decided to escalate the matter and turn the Algerian people against Egypt :

1) Qatar is playing around , yes do not surprised but last month the Prince of Qatar visited Algeria with a very big economic delegation and so the theory says that Qatar wants to replace Egypt economically in Algeria ; what enforces the theory is how Al Jazeera is dealing with the matter and again the visit of the Prince of Qatar but what weakens it the fact that Algeria has a booming economy with opportunities for everyone to invest in and if I am not mistake Qatar will not invest in the same sector we are investing in. Still Al Jazeera was biased even in transferring the football matches , may be this because the number of Algerians in the channel now are more than the Egyptians who are quitting one by one because of the channel policies.

2) The Ambassador of Algeria in Cairo , Abdel Kader El-Hagar who is publicly persona non grata. Ambassador El-Hagar has one hell of record , he had caused a diplomatic crisis between Tehran and he was expelled form there. I think due to the rivalry between Tehran and Cairo he was accepted here and for some reason we did not check his record in Algeria itself. Those who support this theory depend on the facts that his statements in Cairo were contradicting with those in Algerian media . He was also very rude on Egyptian TV when he said “ I warn Egyptians from playing with fire” but again what weakens this theory is the fact that the Algerian regime must know that this is a man of regional and international diplomatic crises ; why would they let him lead them in to a new bigger diplomatic crisis with Cairo after the one he caused with Tehran?? Anyhow this man will not stay longer in Egypt.

3) Bouteflika is terribly sick , the man already suffered from Cancer before and he is not young. This is my first ever theory to be honest because in Cairo we have similar incidents. But the man has received his national team on the 19th of November , of course meeting with the national team does not confirm or deny anything. I am just saying again , we have been taught enough in Egypt to know what a diversion is especially when to it comes to the President’s health. But why would you create a diversion and also a diplomatic crisis with the biggest investor in your country !!??

4) Someone does not want our investment in Algeria , not Qatar but someone else , some general from their army generals with other country than Qatar ; may be a western country.

5) Ahmed Ouyahia has a hand in the issue , Ouyahia is from the expected presidential candidates after Bouteflika and he is just like our ministers in Egypt if I may say but with higher expectations and bloody experience “Really bloody resume that would make Ahmed Ezz a saint” . He is reported to stand against Arabic investment and that he is a close friend to Ronen Bergman. Ouyahia is said to be the financer of Algerian Al Chorouk which was leading the campaign against Egypt. He also was generous enough to send thousands of football hooligans on his expense. Ok what gain he will have from doing all this !!?? If he wants to be a president ,he should have regional allies , plus the Egyptian investments are there from 1998 !!??

6) Said Bouteflika , the younger brother of Bouteflika does not want the Egyptian investments. Said Bouteflika is looking forward to become the president of Algeria after his brother ; another kind of hereditary in North Africa. He is using this game to enforce his power against other generals in Algeria so he could inherit the rule from his brother whose health is going to bad to worse.

7) Said Bouteflika’s fight with Alaa Mubarak over some big arms deal from Lockheed according to Save Egypt front from London , strangely this website did not include the attack on the Egyptians in Sudan nor did it included the fact that the media in Algeria escalated the matter and there was a public mobilization in the country. I do not understand how a football match will help Alaa restore those billions !!??

8) Abdel Aziz Belkhadem also is planning to take over the rule after Bouteflika too and he is trying to win bounces.

Two theories are making the headlines now : Said Bouteflika and the Qatari role. Said Bouteflika is being accused more and more in Egypt that makes me wonder what is really between the Egyptian regime and the Algerian regime. There is no smoke without fire.

I know very well what is going in Cairo , this match my dear friends was used to hide the escape of NDPian Hany Sorour outside the country. This match is not used for the devilish plans of Gamal Mubarak , on the contrary if we won and he kept appearing with the national team here and there ; he would lose bounces.

Sadat has always been blamed by the Pan Arab nationalists and Nasserites that Sinai is still big desert with no development what so ever for real despite the fact that Sinai did not return totally to Egypt when he was alive not to mention he did not stay too long after Camp David accords ; he was killed in 1981 for God sake. Of course no one can blame President Mubarak and ask him why Sinai has been neglected for real in the last 28 years.

I am not here speaking about the tourism development in Sinai , we did not return back Sinai by war and Peace so it would turn in to a big hotel; the Israelis for 6 years did not do this , they built settlements and started to reclaim this desert. Famous Yamit was an example in its agricultural production as legend says. I also remember than Ben-Gurion in 1956 wanted to send settlers and start judaizing of Sinai as soon as possible.

It is a fact that Sinai weakness has always been its emptiness from people , it is not enough to have military bases there only ; you have to have people there , a real population along with the local population there. Sinai is 1/3 of Egypt total size and the huge development of Sharm El-Sheikh proved that you can make something great from this desert. Sinai fell in to occupation twice last century because of it was easy target , of course beside our poor preparations in both 1956 and 1967

Those who lived and remembered the days of late Sadat , remember that he had huge strategic plans for Sinai starting with the liberated parts in order to change demography of the peninsula through reclamation projects and transferring a population from the valley to Sinai. People still remember the Fairoz and the New Ismailia projects which for some unknown reason died just like Anwar Al Sadat.

Now back to the first paragraph ,usually the blame on Al Sadat is associated with the secret articles in the camp David accords ; legend says that he signed on an unannounced article in the accords that banned any real development or reclamation ; well guess what ?? Camp David did not ban any real development in Sinai and there is no secret article at all.

Egyptian journalist and poet Farouk Goweida has exposed this myth in a series of articles in Egyptian Al Shorouk under the title “ Sinai between Camp David and the governmental neglect” . Here are parts “1” and “2” of his report which I am not surprised that it was not published in Al Ahram Daily. This is not the first time he is speaking about Sinai , we all remember how he exposed the great scandal of selling thousands of acres in Sinai to Qatari investors who were cover to Israeli investors.

The second part of the report is very important because it included interesting facts about President Sadat. In the second part Farouk Goweida interviewed former minister of housing “Hasaballah El-Kafraway” who served in both Sadat and Mubarak’s cabinets ; he is from the most respectable ministers in Egypt and it is enough to know that he wrote a letter to Mubarak complaining about the corruption in the country and then found himself out of the ministry in the next reshuffle. I believe “El-Kafrawy” especially what he said goes to what I read and know.

President Sadat asked him to prepare studies for Sinai reclamation and reconstruction with special focus on the Middle Sector , the Middle sector has a very important military strategic importance and it was called “The field of tanks” where we had our famous 1973 Yom Kippur tanks battle there.

President Sadat wanted to reclaim 400,000 acres in this particular area and he also wanted to establish 400 villages there with special requirements.

President Sadat wantedthe army veterans from soldiers to live in those villages , most of them were from the country side and know how to reclaim a land.

President Sadat requested a special design for the houses in those villages and Kafraway supervised the design of these houses along with General Fouad Aziz ; the commander of the second army then.

The design of the house would be normal outside but from inside there would be bunker for weapons and safety bunker from women and Children in the basement.

The prototypes of these houses are already there in Ismailia , you can see it by yourself in the New Meit Abu El-Kom village east Ismailia and in Sinai itself in Romana and Ballouza.

President Sadat wanted to be buried in Sinai so every Egyptian knows that this is an Egyptian land where an Egyptian President was buried there.

President Sadat seemed to know that 1973 war would not be the last war with the Israelis and Sinai will always be part from the Grand Israel dream , he believed in Peace but also he was taken his precautions.

This was late President Sadat and do not ask me why or how suddenly those 400,000 acres project had become part of history.

Sinai now is under the NDP tycoons control , you got the south where you can find Mubarak’s only best friend Hussein Salem and his empire and you got in the North Hassan Ratab and in between tribes with no right to own the land they live on , resorts and acres of drugs.

I read that we can have a similar “2012” scenario in Nile Delta in the future, Sinai could provide as a new hope for millions of citizens , I am not saying that this will happen but real civilized countries think about the future from now and we are facing a real danger and God gave us a lot of land that only needs few effort to turn in to a real paradise ; why we would leave it !!??

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Please watch this clip from yesterday’s episode of “Cairo today” , please focus on the videos which will be shown in the middle , of course you must know that package Amr Adib holds is the package of the Algerian ministry of interior’s special “fighting forces” meal which was given to those thugs brought in the C130 air jets.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Mubarak said in his speech in front of the people’s assembly and the Shura Council that the Egyptian citizens abroad are the responsibility of the state and that the dignity of Egyptians is from the dignity of Egypt !!

I do not know what to say except that Mr. President none of this could have happen if we are enjoying our dignity as Egyptian citizens inside Egypt in the first place !!?? Please tell these words to the victims of police brutality , please them again to thousands of Egyptians abroad who haven been humiliated enough around the globe because of your economic policies for 28 years. Mr. President please these words to the families who lost their members on the borders with Israel , on the board of flight 990 , on the board of Al Salam ferry and on the board of Badr I.

It seems that Alaa Mubarak has a lot to say from that bloody night in Khartoum that left so shaken and so furious , last night he did it again and called a live night news show ; this time it was the official Al Beit Batik.

This time it was much long , he was ballistic and you have something interesting quotes more than the previous time with his famous line “ They were treating us as if we are Jews killing people in Gaza”

Alaa was very angry and he told them he wanted more time on air to express his anger , he would use his right as the President’s son.He was angry from Ibrahim Eissa's Op-ed last Friday in which his brother Gamal and Ahmed Ezz were attacked. Eissa wrote that Gamal and Ezz took the first jet to Cairo leaving the rest of the Egyptians in hell. Alaa was angry despite he was not mentioned at all from near or far , he believed that this attack meant that he and his brothers were cowards despite they left with the national team in the morning. For the record most Egyptians including me thought that the Mubarak brothers left earlier thanks to the telephone call of MP Mustafa Bakery from Khartoum in that night.

It is ironic because if Alaa Mubarak bought Al Dostor earlier last night he would know that Eissa does not hate him at him as he wrote in his Op-ed “ 12 Reasons to love Alaa Mubarak”

Also if he reads Al-Dostor and other opposition newspapers , does not he read

Alaa Mubarak continued his attack on Algeria in a strange way considering his position as the first son. Alaa does not want any relation with Algeria from any kind and he attacked the generals and Pasha of Algeria !!!! Alaa will not even accept the apology of the President !!?? “What do you want then ??”

Alaa also said that if we are going to play with Algeria again in the African national Cup , there will be no woman or child , it will be man to man I believe !!

I love this quote

I told “Papa” that we are going to with the national team

I also I love the fact that he does not know the name of Khairy Ramadan and kept calling him Mr.Khalid !!

Anyhow Gamal Mubarak must hate himself because in two phone calls only Alaa won a lot of popularity among the public regardless of what you and I think about him and his family.